[This post has been updated with additional information.] I just received this sad news: Preston Larson, former American Guild of Organists Hawaii Chapter member, passed away on December 15, 2020 in Phoenix AZ. He was born March 18, 1942 and was Emeritus Professor of Music at Brigham Young University Hawaii, where he taught organ performance… Read More RIP Preston Larson 1942-2020
Everyone knows that this Christmas is going to be different — all because of the pandemic. For one thing, this will be the first time in eight years that I will not be leaving Hawaii at Christmas. Yes, it’s true, since 2012 I have spent all my Christmases in California (except for three years ago,… Read More A different kind of Christmas
FDR. JFK. MLK. We love reducing these people’s names down to three letters as evidenced by these representations of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, and Martin Luther King. Here are some more: LBJ. RBG. AOC. I bet you got real excited when you saw the title of this blog post, though, eh? Your first… Read More AOC at LCH
Until the year 2013, if it was the first Sunday in Advent, you could 100% count on hearing me play “Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme,” Johann Sebastian Bach’s transcription of the fourth movement of Cantata 140 for organ. It is also known as the opening piece in the collection known as the Schübler chorales.… Read More It’s Advent, already!
Last Saturday night I had been watching TV and then got up to get a drink of water when I saw the trail of blood, coming out from the refrigerator! If this had been a horror movie, the presence of blood dripping out meant that there was a body inside! Drip, drip, drip… the blood… Read More A tale of two turkeys
Last night was the official debut of the Estonia piano at the Lutheran Church of Honolulu, which culminated in a Facebook Live event featuring Maika’i Nash and Mark Wong. They performed music for two pianos in a concert called Taevamuusika, which is Estonian for “music of the heavens.” You can refresh your memory on the… Read More Taevamuusika
Many churches have not been able to hold in-person worship services during the pandemic and have turned to technology to keep us together. Church musicians have stepped up to the challenge and have become film producers, concerned not only with the music-making, but also video production, creating virtual choir performances, in essence, they have had… Read More Video wizardry
The last two Early Music Hawaii concerts have been virtual, meaning that a video was created of the performance and then posted at a specified time. As an audience member you received an email message with the link to open the file. Obviously someone was behind the scenes, creating the email link in it, and… Read More The new normal
You may recall that my husband, Carl, was the recipient of a Philip Belt fortepiano upon the death of his college piano teacher, Else Geissmar. Then when Carl died, he bequeathed the fortepiano to our friend, Mark Russell, and I bought a small pipe organ. Now Mark is moving and will have no space for… Read More The fortepiano returns!
Last week the board members of Early Music Hawaii were treated to a veritable musical feast—we got a sneak peek at the video by Ensemble Les Délices which will be released this coming Friday, November 13 at 7:00 pm. You’ll be able to view it through the following Thursday, November 19. By a musical feast,… Read More A musical feast